Fukushima Global Communication ProgrammeWorking Paper Series
Number 11 — December 2015

Ethnographic Perspective on
Oral Narratives of Risk
Communication

David H. Slater

Haruka Danzuka

Sophia University
University of Tokyo

Fukushima Global Communication ProgrammeThis working paper series shares research produced as part of the Fukushima Global Communication (FGC) Programme, aresearch initiative of the United Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (UNU‑IAS). The FGC
Programme applies a human security approach to examine impacts of the Great East Japan Earthquake, tsunami and nuclear
accident of 11 March, 2011 on people and society, and the challenges of the recovery process in Fukushima. It also focuses on
issues of risk and information provision, aiming to improve understanding of how the threat of radiation is perceived, and thespecific challenges of risk communication related to nuclear energy.
This working paper is an output of the FGC research workshop “Understanding and Communicating Risks Post Fukushima”,
held in Tokyo on 12–13 November 2015. The workshop brought together international experts to explore the specificchallenges of understanding and discussing risks related to nuclear accidents, and identify appropriate and effective forms ofrisk communication.
To find out more, please visit fgc.unu.edu© 2015 United Nations University. All Rights Reserved.
The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations University.

Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

ABSTRACT
Based on the in-depth interviews of more than 50 Fukushimaresidents, including many who are now living as refugees inTokyo, from a corpus of Fukushima interviews of about 200,
this paper documents our informants’ shifting understand‑ing and often disillusionment with the state’s managementof disaster information. We outline two key terms, the anzen
shinwa (安全神話, the myth of safety) that many residents felt
lead to a de-legitimation of the state’s role in disaster, andthe role of “goyogakusha”(御用学者, scholar beholden to
the government) as the foundation of a local critique of thecollusive relationship between the state and the scientificcommunity. In both of these dynamics, it was the politics ofinformation flow that was at the heart of the problem. We of‑fer this as ‘immanent critique,’ a synthesis informants’ under‑
standing of their own situation to illustrate key problematics
with the expectation that these serve as the starting point ofany policy discussion.
抄録
２００時間以上に及ぶ福島でのオーラルヒストリー・インタビ
ューの中から、福島から東京に避難された方々を含む50名以上へのインタビューをもとに、福島第一原子力発電所の事故後の政府の対応や情報管理への想いをまとめた。更に、「安全神
話」と「御用学者」という２つのキーワードを通して、国や科学界への信頼の崩壊とその影響を考察する。問題の中心にあるのは、情報の流れを巡る策略である。この論文では、インタビューから浮かび上がってきた不信感や将来への不安などの声を、そのままの形で「内在する批判」として取り上げている。これらがいかなる政策議論の開始点となることを期待する。

Introduction
This research note addresses the flow of information, of‑ficial and unofficial, around the post 3.11 period, especiallyas it pertains to the issues of radiation danger aroundthe Fukushima reactor. Our convener Sato Akiko notesthat “The consequences of faulty risk communication aresevere. It can create inconsistent, controversial information;
misinterpretation of messages; false rumors; unnecessary
exposure to additional risks; and a sense of agitation andhopelessness.” Yes, and much more. It is sometimes said
that agentless false rumors was the 4th disaster of the 3.11
period (after earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown).
Based on our research, it would be more accurate to saythat the governmental failure to provide timely, accurate
and intelligible information to the affected population wasby far the more damaging information-related fiasco, all themore inexcusable because it was supposed to have been
managed and executed by the state, in its many levels. This
paper is about the ways in which our informants narrated to
us how the state failed to appropriately manage informa‑tion flows, the subsequent loss of credibility it suffered as aresult, and the consequences there in.
Research was done through interviews with more than 50

2people since 2012 to present, mostly young mothers, whowere living in Fukushima at the time of the accident. We
conducted interviews at informant’s houses or local cafes,
mainly in Iwaki and Fukushima city, but also in Tokyo withformer residents of Fukushima who evacuated outside. In‑
terviews were semi-structured and were about 1 to 2 hours
each on average. All informants introduced in this paper
have signed a release form for their stories to be published.
We have written about the importance of information in thecontext of disaster (Slater, Nishimura and Kindstrand, 2012)
and its effects on the social community (Slater, Morioka
and Danazuka 2014) which two studies that provide a basic
outline of the situation.
Each of our examples discussed here are, to varying de‑grees, traceable back to a crisis of legitimacy of the govern‑
ment in the eyes of local residents. The state’s handlingof information during the 3.11 crisis led many to doubt its
competence in dealing with information, and subsequently,
its care for residents, and even its commitment to safety of
its own population.
What we present here is not meant to be a random sample;
we do not have the quantitative survey data to make suchclaims. Rather, what we attempt to outline is the sorts of lo‑
cal explanations for information failure that we have heard.
So, we sketch here, when information production, circula‑tion and reception is perceived as having failed, why andhow is this failure understood, explained, and what sort ofconclusions are drawn by local residents for this failure.
Anzen Shinwa 安全神話: The myth of safety
The failure of the state in terms of information management
begins long before the meltdown, with the promotion of
the reactors as safe, desirable and maybe even necessary.
Given the substantial discrepancy between how people
narrated their pre and post-311 awareness, it is difficult not
to see a systematic attempt by the state and corporate sec‑
tors to misrepresent or at least obscure the risks associatedwith nuclear energy in general and of the particular plantthat has been put into their communities. The way this nowlost feeling of security is most often expressed is as the“myth of safety.”
爆発しても、こんな地元に住んでいながら、原発の近くに住んでいながら、原発の危険性っていうのを普段意識してないので… まあ大丈夫大丈夫って安全神話があったので。４０キロ離れてば大丈夫だろうと思ってて。爆
発したっていうのをニュースで聞いても近所のお母さん
達と外で立ち話とか、爆発したんだってねって、子どもたちも外で遊びながら、学校は休みになったので、土日だ
ったのかな、金曜日が３月１１日だったので、土日があって、立ち話して子どもたちが遊んでいるのを見ながら、原発のうわさ話をしてて。
Even though I live so close to the nuclear power
plant, I was never aware of the dangers of nuclear
power plants. We live about 40km from the plant,
so we thought we were okay, because we had theEthnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

原発がそれほど危ないというのは、私の中で知識としてはなかったんだよね。よく私の小学校、もう中学校の時にもそうだったけど、原子力のポスターとか一生懸命書
いて。原子力の日、１０月の２９日かな？そのポスターとかよく書いて提出して、賞もらってたなーとか。今考えればとんでもないことだなって思いますよね。あんまり、その危ないという知識はなかったです。
「安全だ。安全だ。」って子供の頃から。埋め込まれてたんで。うん、教育的に。子供の頃から原発はいいものだとそういう教育を受けているので、そんなに怖いもんだと思ってなかったんですよね。地震の避難訓練はしてるけど、原発が爆発した時の避難訓練はしてないから。うん。で「爆発したよ」と言われても、あーそうなんだしか、どうしたらいいのだろうしか思わなかったね私も。

myth of safety (anzen shinwa), we thought that if wewere 40km away, we were okay. Even after we heard
on the news that there was an explosion, because
school was canceled and the weekend followed the
explosion, I was chatting and talking about rumorsof the plant with my neighbors outside, while watching our kids play.
This is a mother in her early 30s, who lives in Iwaki city in
Fukushima with her two children. After talking to us about
her initial (lack of) reaction to the nuclear power plant
explosion, she went on to explain that she only realized
the possible dangers after seeing others evacuating close
to her house, then again, evacuating from there to moreinland areas of the prefecture;

I wasn’t aware that the nuclear power plant could be
so dangerous. In elementary school, even in middle
school, we all drew posters for the nuclear power
plant on the day of the nuclear power plant (genpatsu no hi), I think it was October 29?, and the bestposters would get prizes. It is horrific to think backof it now. We didn’t know that it was dangerous. We
were told over and over that nuclear power is safeand because of this education, it never occurred tous that it could be so dangerous. There were trainings for how to evacuate when the earthquake hit,
but we never were told what to do when the nuclear
power plant exploded. So, when I heard that it did
explode, I thought “oh okay” and “so what should I
do?” but that was about it.

そのうちに … 目の前が小学校なんですけど、そこに原発の近くの人が避難してくるようになって、体育館とかに。でそういうのを見て、最初はそういうのを見てここは大丈夫なんだろうと思ったんだけれども、その人たちも次の所に移動を始めちゃって。でその人たちも次の日はまた移動を始めちゃったんで、ここもまずいのかなってなってきて。
There is an elementary school right in front of myhouse and evacuees were staying in the gym, sowatching that, I thought I was okay. But after awhile, the next day, they started moving again, andthat’s when I started to sense that even here might
be dangerous.
For most of our interviewees, in response to our openended question of “tell us about the situation on andsince March 11th,” this is how they started their narratives,
explaining to us their lack of knowledge about the risk of
nuclear power plants and dangers of radiation, of which,they only realized after the accident. While some individu‑
als expressed that they had their personal doubts, almost
everyone told us, that they believed that nuclear power
plants were safe because that was the only thing they weretold by local governments and TEPCO. (See also Watanabe2014) To say that the desire to see their own circumstances
as safe is self-serving is surely true, a fact that makes thestate seem not only complicit but also aiding and abetting
such beliefs.
After the explosion, this false belief that nuclear power
plants are safe have started to be called “myth of safety”(安全神話 anzen-shinwa). The word started to be used firstamong anti-nuclear activists, but has then become widely
shared among locals and came up in our interview fairly
often.1 Labeling the safety discourse before the accident
as a “myth,” this word express the great shock and disil‑lusionment the accident gave to residents in realizing thatthey were “lied to” by the government and TEPCO that thenuclear power plant was safe.

3

Effects of state failure
The lack of knowledge of how dangerous nuclear power
plants were, somewhat ironically, led them to be extremely
dependent on information and instructions from the na‑
tional and local authorities or experts, the very agents that
had betrayed their trust in the first place. We have written
elsewhere how this realization of governmental duplic‑
ity led to politicization of “regular” people, in Fukushima
and Tokyo, a process that often involved the processesof systematic self and group education, the collection of
first hand data, and its sharing for analysis among diverse
groups (Danzuka, Uno, and Houser 2015). This process was
instrumental in the emergence (or re-emergence) of many
local activist groups. This is an inspiring story that is today
being played out all over the country and, we think, ischanging the shape of civil society in various ways.
But when we look at the far larger group (larger than those
who become activists) of people who have not become
politicized, we see a number of different positions on therole of the state in information crisis management.
1.

The failure of the government and TEPCO to acknowl‑edge and educate the public about the dangers of
nuclear plant before the meltdown hurt their credibility

Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

so much that it compromised their subsequent efforts
of managing the information flow and to aid the af‑
fected population.
2.

The state’s use of changing and obscure technical in‑formation, led to the rejection of scientific information
all together, and a not infrequent lapse into a largely
unprincipled, even conspiracy-theory-like approach incertain communities.

3.

The lack and incompressibility of much official data
led many to seek for non-governmental or non-official
sources of information. As noted above, sometimes
the results have been lifesaving in the short term andpolitical liberating in the longer term; other times it has
led to confusion and danger.

4.

The association of scientific data with the untrustwor‑
thy government, apparent for example in the use of“goyogakusha” (御用学者, scholar beholden to thegovernment), damaged the trust local populations has
in science as a whole in the context of disaster.

power plants.
She was relieved that none of her relatives were killed in
the earthquake and tsunami—and like others, did not evenhave a chance to know that the real danger was the sub‑sequent radiation leakage. She only found out about thenuclear power plant explosion through talking with her hus‑
band and relatives on the phone, and through sharing that
information with others who were staying at the hospital.
She told us that the lack of information led to greater fear,and she tried to get as much information as she could fromher mobile phone once the connection became regular.
Unintelligibility of information
Even if you had information, if you did not have the tools tounderstand them, it is also a frightening experience. Many
went to lectures on radiation by experts held in city halls
and community centers, to get information on what is hap‑pening and what they should do to protect themselves.
何マイクロシーベルト、何ミリシーベルトとかベクレルとか、全部外国語みたいでどういう意味か全然分からなかった。

As ethnographers and oral historians, ill at ease offering
policy recommendations, we below outline how the inform‑
ants in our research explain this loss of faith in the govern‑ment’s—a loss that is largely the function of information
mismanagement—and some of the consequences.2
Lack of information
The levels of information failures were many. The first,
as noted above, was a pre-crisis failure to education the
population—a failure from which there is little going back.
The second was the lack of relevant information in the im‑mediate crisis. A women who gave birth on March 10th inFukushima city explains.
ラジオが、福島が一つしか放送局がないんですよ。私がいた病院は電気も水道もダメだったので、テレビも見れずそのラジオだけ唯一、なんか乾電池式のラジオで先生が付けてくれたんですけど。全部、連絡下さいみた
いな、行方不明者の人をずっと永遠とこう、「何県、何さん、元気ですか？連絡下さい」というのを。ずっとそんな放送しかなかったので、原発がどうなっているかとか、津波がどうなっているかとか、そういうのの情報が全然入ってこなくて。
There is only one radio station in Fukushima. The
hospital I was staying in had no electricity, so theradio that the doctor turned on for us was the only
source of information. However, they were only
playing messages from people who are looking for
those who are lost, like “this person from this prefecture, please let us know if you are okay”. So we
couldn’t know what was going on with the nuclear

4

Mico-cerverts, mili-cerverts and becqurels all
sounded like a foreign language to me, and I could
not understand what they meant
For many, like this grandmother living by herself in Iwaki
who later decided to evacuate to Tokyo with her daughterand grandchild, it was difficult to understand the scientificexplanations and the technological words used to explain
the situation. She said, that even though she clung to thebroadcast news and went to local lectures to get all theinformation she could, it did not make her understandingof the situation better. Actually, she was more confused
and more scared. The result of such obscuring technicallanguage was not only confusion; the use of such terms are
intimidating, frightening to local people because they carry
the patina of official and sometimes emergency directive.
Some of the people we talked to internalized the fault,
at least initially thinking that they themselves were too
stupid to understand this information. Increasingly more,
blamed the government. As one older man from Koriyama
explained, “We are not fancy people. The [government]
should know that.” He then added ironically, “Are they too
smart to explain things in ways that we can understand?”Critique generated by our informants
In increasingly levels of venality, local explanations of the
failure to provide timely, useful and accurate information
could be summarized as such.
1.

The government is incompetent. It cannot gather, ana‑Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

2.

3.

lyze and disseminate radiation information

governments. (See Svendsen 2013 for related discussion.)

The government is uncaring. Thinking that the govern‑
ment must be able to manage this information—imag‑
ining that they must have been prepared for this obvi‑
ous occurrence—many reasoned that it must not reallybe taking seriously the situation of the local residents.

State and Science: goyogakusha

The government intentionally puts residents at risk.
This explanation suggests intentional and willful harm
being done. Often, this explanation is linked to theprotection of corporate capital, and in particular, to
TEPCO, over and above the safety of the communities
affected.

Uninformed Support
It should be noted that by and large, while virtually no one
we spoke to had a completely positive view of the gov‑
ernment’s efforts, very few became politically active. In
more recent sets of interviews (generated through a very
different set of contacts), we have found what is probably
a numerical majority: those who are NOT open and vocal
in their criticism of the state’s ability to manage informa‑tion. Again, while refraining from any claims to representa‑
tive sample, it is worthy to note that those who were least
critical, were also, usually by their own admission, least
informed. Perhaps not surpassingly, those who are lesscritical about the state’s handling of the situation are lesslikely to talk about it. They are also less likely to engage incritical inspection of it, develop other sources of informa‑tion (reading websites or blogs, going to events, etc). They
are, again by their own admission, simply and relatively
passively accepting what their government has to say andthe information it has to provide.
Consequently, we are not presenting ‘one side of the story,’leaving out the other. Among any of our interviews, there isvery little critical or systematic review of the government’s
handling who have concluded that they did a good job.
The community members are not, by and large, defendersof the state’s handing of the situation; they are agnostic
if they have a position at all. Most explain, they are tired,and ‘simply do not want to think anymore.’ More in depth
interviews with the same person over time reveals often
more anxiety is just below the surface. Peer pressure, fear,
experience or exhaustion is not hard to see in many of ourinterviews. Explained one women in Koriyama, “I don’t
worry about getting more information; I am here and I can‑not leave so I have to be ok. My kids have to healthy.’ Webring this up here because if as Sato mentioned, we seek
to promote some sort of “participatory” approach to risk
communication, the retreat into willful refusal to become
engaged in the data-driven situation by those who ostensi‑
bly support the government’s effort is perhaps even moredamaging than those others who have become forced toadopt critical and/or even adversarial stances to their own

5

Our final example is somewhat different, and one that ad‑
dresses the status of expert or scientific knowledge, andits perceived use and misuse by the government. At issue
is the definition of the term “safe.” We saw a number ofdifferent patterns. First, many of our informants reported
that local and national media officials repeatedly andbluntly said that the situation is “safe.” (What some cameto understand the government asserting was that situation
will cause “no immediate physical harm.” But as was often
pointed out to us, to identify any meltdown of a nuclear
reactor as “safe” because no one was hit by debris in the
exposure is misleading at best. Second, Even after thegovernment published more specific information, locals
were confused and discouraged by the changing orders ofevacuation and the changing of annual amounts of radia‑
tion that is acceptable to enter one’s body. How could thisdeclaration of safety change even before there was any
systematic radiation surface testing (let alone the effects
on bodies through ingestion or contact)?
はじめ信用していたものがあとからなって覆されますよね。数字も、そうじゃなかったって何日か経ってからして話していたんで。そこから信用できなくちゃったんですよね。はじめはいいように出しといて、最後は全部ひっく
り返して期待を裏切られ。全部数字をかえてきて、はじめからその数値を知っていたくせに変えてたんじゃないの？こっちから言わせればと、疑ちゃいますよね。 そこで大丈夫じゃないっていう発信をしたらパニックになるからとかそういう考えのもと言わないでいるとか、私たちは裏をかくじゃないけど、、
Even things that we believed at first is flipped awhile later. Numbers too. They said that the initial
numbers were wrong a few days after they firstannounced it. I lost trust in them ever since. They
first presented numbers that were much lower, andfooled us and lost our trust. I’m starting to thinkthat they knew the real numbers from the beginningand changed them on purpose to fit their needs.
I started to think that they are not saying certain
things so that we don’t panic, I have started to
doubt like that.
Refusal to establish and/or be responsible for stable
criteria of “safety.”
The third pattern is somewhat more complex. We repeat‑
edly heard examples of representatives of government, ofcorporate interests (TEPCO) or the scientific community ad‑
dressing audiences to provide information that would help
community members make sense of the tragedy and theimmediate risks involved. After sitting through a presenta‑tion in a local community center, various charts and tables

Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Riskof numbers and graphs, one women stood up to ask what
was on everyone mind: are we safe? The scientist reply was
this. “Well, that is hard to say. What exactly is ‘safe’? I thinkthat maybe each of us has our own understanding of safe,
and I do not want to force my ideas on you.”Amidst the furrowed brows and pained expressions of con‑fused and frightened mothers, the one women continued,“We have no idea if it is safe—that is why we are here. You
are the scientist. You have to tell us.” An old woman nearby
sighed and said to her friend, “Let’s go home. This is
another ‘scientist beholden to the government’ [goyðgaku‑sha].” When asked how she could tell, she replied: “Whatsort of scientist has ever said he does ‘not know what safemeans’? He is too stupid to help us or is really probably ly‑ing.” (Slater, Morioka and Danzuka, p. 491). The state’s andscientific experts being unable and/or unwilling to address
issues of safety was seen as perverse, irresponsible andself-servicing by most of our informants.
Many studies of disaster information point to the impor‑tance of the dynamic between scientific and lay sources,uses and circulation of information that might bridge thisgap. Instances such as those offered in the first half of
this paper illustrate how this this sort of bridging activity
is rendered problematic from the start due to the failureof scientific discourse to be made accessible—a common
failure in Japan and elsewhere. (See also Penney 2011.) But
this is a more extreme case with the willful and intention
withholding of an answer to the only real question on peo‑
ple’s minds—is this safe? The use of terms such as “goyð‑gakusha” illustrate the failure of the scientific community
to retain its own credibility, the credibility that comes frombeing intendant from the government’s attempt to manage
and convince the lay community of safety.
Scientific discourse as objective and uselessThis is not to say that we are unaware of the reasons often
offered for such withholding. Explained one scientist from
Tokyo University after an event in Sendai, “’safe’ and “safe‑ty” are not a scientific terms. They are judgment calls andcannot be objective evaluations. As such, he explained, “Icannot pronounce something as safe or not, at least not asa responsible scientist. All I can do is give the readings.”
One younger man at the event asked, “But is it responsible
for you to NOT tell these people if it is safe or not?” Thescientist shrugged, “Well it is all a matter of responsibil‑ity (責任).” It is uncommon for a scientist or governmental
official to admit this, but it is just what many suspect: thatthat no one from the state or the “goyogakusha” wanted
to be responsible the findings that they themselves were
presenting, and the consequences that they or their state
sponsored might be associated with. “It is just numbers,
numbers. You cannot understand with numbers. Even [thescientist] cannot understand with numbers.”
The lay and local critique of state and science, as embod‑

6

ied in the term “goyogakusha” should not be interpreted
as suggesting scientific information is or should be unrelat‑
ed to the state. While it is true that most of our informants
believed that the scientific community should not produce
information that is simply supporting state policy, this does
not mean that the state and scientific community should be
unconnected. Actually, the opposite is true: the state must
support and be responsible for the information produced
by an independent scientific community. And more to thepoint, they must be responsible for the real-world conse‑
quences of these findings. That is, while recognizing thatscientific community could not make determinations ofsafety—in recognition of their professional limitations—thestate must do exactly this. They must decide what is safe
as a way to be responsible for this community, and the citi‑
zens, it serves. This is what the state would not do. Instead,they flooded the lay community with data they could notunderstand and were then unwilling to make clear determi‑
nation as to the safety of the situation.
Doing so, they left the local residents in a position of
extreme precariousness that contravenes the limits of
responsibly governing. As one grandmother explained,“Should we be surprised? Governmental officials want toshield themselves. So they just talk numbers to us.” Shepaused, “But at a time like this? Can they do something like
that, even now?” In some ways, the popular skepticism ofscientific, expert discourse is but the collateral damage ofthe crisis of legitimacy suffered by the state: guilt by asso‑
ciation with the state’s efforts to cover up, as much as fromfailure of experts to deploy scientific discourse in meaning‑
ful and intelligible ways to a local community.
Theoretical implications are intertwined with the political
implications at this point. It becomes clear that our mod‑els of scientific information, as produced by experts andprovided to the lay community, is a simplistic and eveninaccurate communication model, especially in those situ‑
ations where the information is potentially life threatening.
When the lay population assign a particular set of associa‑
tions to the producers of scientific discourse through its use
by a local or national government, disaster communication
becomes even more complicated.
If there is a policy implication, implicit in the narratives that
we have collected, it is the expectation that the role of thestate is to support the generation of information, to author‑
ize and stand behind these findings necessarily permeates
production, transmission and reception of this informa‑tion. Moreover, it must go one step beyond, and to evenbe responsible for its consequences. These consequences
include, at a very minimum, to set and communicate clear
criteria for “safe” levels of exposure. The state then must
be willing to morally and financially take reasonability for
negative consequences for those who might suffer eventhough they are following these directives. On the other
hand, the state must be willing to organize and financially
support the evacuation of those areas that are not consid‑

Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

ered safe. To simply provide technical and often confusing
information to an untutored lay population, and then sug‑gest that they come to their own decisions, clearly as a way
to avoid moral, legal and fiscal obligations is irresponsible
and venal.
Policy Recommendations
The following are some of the policy recommendations thathave emerged from our study. They reflect the problem
that have come from problematic disaster information
production, circulation and reception. These recommenda‑
tions are directed at the government—sometimes local,
sometimes national, on the assumption that citizens andcommunities, NPOs and other civic groups are not the ones
who would or should receive policy recommendations.
The overall recommendation is simple: Governments
should not lie to its citizens.
(When this occurs, all subsequent disaster communication
becomes problematic)should not pronounce a pre-failure reactor “safe.”
5.

Post disaster:
1. A government should provide timely and accurate
disaster and radiation information to the citizens.
2.

The government should acknowledge the limits of thisknowledge immediately.

3.

The governmental should present information in waysthat allows citizens to make sense of it.

4.

The movement must make recommendations as tosafety procedures to its citizens. That is, it must declare“safe” or “not safe.”

5.

The government should take responsibility for its rec‑ommendations, so that if a “safe” area or period turns
out not to be safe, they government will compensate
and take care of the citizens.

More specifically:
Pre-Disaster (the problem of 安全神話)
1. The government must provide the citizens with a clear
understanding of the risks involved in nuclear energy
before any accident occurs.
2.

3.

4.

Governments should honestly reveal the risks of plac‑
ing a nuclear reactor in relatively close proximity to acommunity before it is put there.
Governments should honestly provide information on
any leakage or reactor failures during the course ofoperation.
If it is going to resist the nomenclature of “safety”(what is safe and what is not) after a meltdown, it

The government should provide and advertise inde‑
pendent study and dissemination of reactor safety or
danger to the community in ways that clearly disentan‑
gle any actual or perceived conflict of interest.

Re: scientific and/or expert production of information (theproblem of 御用学者)
1. The government should identify and support a fullrange of “experts” to evaluate the situation.
2.

The government should establish and/or support inde‑
pendent scientific (市民測定室) bodies before, during
and after an accident to evaluate risk.

3.

The relationships between the government and the sci‑
entific community and esp. of those scientists who are
actively engaged in risk assessment should be trans‑parent and open.

David H. Slater is Director of the Institute of Comparative Culture and a Professor of Cultural Anthropology and Japanese Studies at Sophia University. Since March
2011, he has run a project called Voices from Tohoku (http://tohokukaranokoe.org/) that combines volunteer work with oral narrative interviews in post-disaster Japan;
with 500 hours of footage, it is the largest video archive of the 311 disasters of its kind in Japan. He is the co-editor of Japan Copes With Calamity: Ethnographies of
the Earthquake, Tsunami and Nuclear Disasters of March 2011 (translated into Japanese as 東日本大震災の人類学: 津波、原発事故と被災者たちの「その後」, with Tom
Gill and Brigitte Steger; and has co-authored with Rika Morioka and Haruka Danzuka of “Micro-politics of Radiation: Young Mothers Looking for a Voice in Post-3.11
Fukushima” in Critical Asian Studies.
Haruka Danzuka is a graduate student at the University of Tokyo Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, studying in the field of Anthropology. She has been involvedin Professor Slater’s Voices from Tohoku project since 2012, conducting more than 50 oral narrative interviews in Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, and also with evacuees
from Fukushima. She was a co-author with David H. Slater and Rika Morioka of “Micro-politics of Radiation: Young Mothers Looking for a Voice in Post-3.11 Fuku‑
shima” in Critical Asian Studies, and co-authored “Activist Moms and Radical Women” in the American Anthropology Newsletter. She has presented her work at
Japanese and international conferences.

7

Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk Communication Ethnographic Perspective on Oral Narratives of Risk

8

Notes
Of course, the word itself is much older and used in a number of different contexts, including the most often cited in Kawai
2011 and more recently Nishiyama, Noboru and Takatoshi Imada (2012).
1

Note: a larger point here that goes beyond the parameters of this paper but should be relevant to our general discussion,is that with the diffusion of digital media, from websites to blogs, from list serve to Line groups, etc, we see people gather‑ing so much data themselves that it might not be reasonable anymore to even speak of state control of information any‑
more, in particular in the context of disaster. It might be, that even in this age of “State Security Acts,” neither the JapaneseState, nor any other state can longer “control” information in any systematic way. For us as scholars to make recommenda‑
tions for improved information practices to a state or any other unitary body may be anachronistic to the point of misrepre‑
sentation of the true complexity of the media environment today.
2

References
Danzuka, H., Uno, S., & Houser, M. (2015). Activist Mothers and Radical Women. The Asia-Pacific Journal; Japan Focus. Retrieved October 10, 2015, from http://www.
anthropology-news.org
Kawai, M. (2004). Anzen shinwa hokai no paradokkusu [The paradox of the collapse of Japan’s safety myth]. Tokyo, Japan: Iwanami Shoten.
Nishiyama, N., and Imada T. (2012). Zero Risuku Gensou to Anzen Shinwa no Yuragi: HigashinihonDaishinsai to Fukushima Genpatsujiko wo tsujita Nihonjin no Risukuis‑
hiki no Henka (The instability of Zero Risk fantasy and Safety Myth: Changing risk perceptions after the Great East Japan Earthquake and Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant
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